


Promises and Prognistication

by clevagirl (lescafenix)



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Angst, M/M, Sexual Tension, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-31
Updated: 2018-12-31
Packaged: 2019-10-01 09:45:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,420
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17241983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lescafenix/pseuds/clevagirl
Summary: Noctis and Ignis reunite in the World of Ruin and share truths, predictions and an intimate moment.





	Promises and Prognistication

**Author's Note:**

  * For [HisGlasses](https://archiveofourown.org/users/HisGlasses/gifts).



“A beard?”

Ignis’s voice is a throaty rumble, breaking the heavy silence cloaking them in the dark caravan. Noctis turns his cheek instinctively into Ignis’s gingerly exploring fingertips.

“No razors in the Crystal,” Noctis murmurs, his chuckle at his own lame joke dissolving into awkward silence once more. What do you say to someone who you’ve known your entire life, but now, in this moment, you wonder if you know at all?

“Hmm.” 

_ Some things never change _ , Noctis thinks.  _ Still can’t make him laugh. _

After the initial catch-up with the guys at Hammerhead, Noctis had wanted some one-on-one time with each of them. He knows where his road leads, and after leaving them waiting for a decade, he wants to make sure he gets closure. The others will wait. Ignis has to be first. Always Ignis.

Noctis feels as though he owes Ignis, more than any of the others. Not just for his sacrifice in Altissia -- no, for the sacrifice of his entire life. He grapples with guilt, about all of the time spent taking Ignis for granted, all that time wasted when each moment took him one step closer to his inevitable destiny.

And now, here he was, wasting time again in regret.

“Are you with me, Noct?”

Ignis’s voice has a soft throatiness to it that makes the hairs on Noctis’s skin prickle to attention. He sounds tired, almost vulnerable. 

“Yeah, Specs. I’m here.” He smiles when Ignis’s fingers reach the corner of his mouth, and Ignis mirrors the expression in response. Noctis isn’t sure who is trying harder to reassure who. 

_ Is this how it’s going to be until the end?  _ Noctis wonders.  _ Going around in circles, performing our duties, playing our roles like the dutiful sons we are? _   


Noctis has never questioned his role before. He has never questioned Ignis -- his thoughts, his feelings, his desires. He has always been content to go where he was driven, do what he was told, get it over with so he could go back to playing video games or fishing.

Ten years in a crystal gives a guy a lot of time to gain perspective. To replay moment after moment of 14 years together. To cringe at every time he had turned his nose up at a prepared meal because it wasn’t what he wanted, remembering now the tired, disappointed sigh. To think about how after every shower there were warm towels and his slippers waiting for him. To remember quiet nights playing video games with his feet in Ignis’s lap, while Ignis read.

Ten years in a crystal gives a guy a lot of time to realize just how good he had it. Emerging into this dark hell-world had driven the perspective home. He was overwhelmed and desperate to fix it. Desperate to make it right.

“Noct.” Ignis’s palm flattens on Noctis’s cheek. “Do you need some time alone?”

“No. No.” Noctis quickly replies, covering Ignis’s hand with his own. “I’m just-- I’m in my head. Sorry.”

“No need to apologize. I’m merely concerned for your mental state,” Ignis replies.

Noctis chuckles.  _ Same song, new verse. _

_ It’s time to change the tune. _

“I’m fine, Iggy. I just--” Words were always difficult for Noctis. He always felt so full of emotion, a roiling, painful cacophony of confusion that he didn’t know what to do with. Even with everything he knew now, that the Draconian had showed him in the Crystal. Tangled with his own memories and regrets was the vision of Ignis taking the Ring of the Lucii from his unconscious body in Altissia and placing it on his own finger. 

“I just-- I--” Noctis grunts with frustration. “Damn it!”

“Don’t tax yourself, Noct,” Ignis murmurs. “Trying to force things will do no good.”

“Still giving me a way out,” Noctis laughs humorlessly, more chagrined than grateful any more. What was taken for granted at 20 was not a good look at 30. “When are you going to stop bailing me out?”

Ignis tilts his head, lips pursed. “Never.”

Noctis laughs again. “Of course.”

_ Of course. _

He takes a deep breath, then speaks his next words carefully. “You’re not going to be able to bail me out of what’s coming, Iggy.”

Ignis swallows audibly. His fingers curl on Noctis’s cheek and his thumb sweeps across his beard again, the gesture more tender this time and less exploratory.

“I know.”

Noctis leans in to the touch. There is a finality to Ignis’s words that drives home the reality even more than what the gods themselves had revealed. If Ignis says it’s so, then it really is so. 

“Iggy. Can I-- I’d like to-- Can I touch you?”

There is a long, heavy pause. Ignis says carefully, “I would deny my king nothing.”

“But what about me?” Noctis asks softly. “Without the crown, without the raiments?”

“Noct-- I would deny you nothing.”

Noctis touches his face, brushes his thumb over his lip. It is crashing in on him exactly what he is about to lose, and the pain is nearly unbearable. 

Ignis’s breath hitches, and he whispers, “Noct?” His hands finally stop exploring Noctis’s face, instead sliding to the back of his head, his hair, his neck.

The gods have no purpose for love. The gods have no need for emotion. Intimacy means nothing when it comes to Noctis’s only reason for living. But in this moment, with this man who was only meant to be a means to an end for all of the puppet masters controlling both of their lives, Noctis found meaning in it all. And while the thought of leaving him made Noctis want to scream, the thought of giving him a better life made the thought of what was to come even better.

Noctis gently touches the scars along Ignis’s cheek, brushing his fingertips over his marred eye. Ignis shies away, shaking his head. But Noctis follows, spreading his fingers along his cheek. The ring burns heavy on his finger as his fingertips soothe the ridged skin, visions replaying in his mind’s eye of all that the Crystal had showed him during his long imprisonment. The sight of Ignis in agony, his skin and vision burning away while Noctis lay impotent, useless, had fueled his rage and willingness to do what must be done unlike any other vision the Draconian had shown him. It had propelled him from his stasis and into Ignis’s arms, and he grapples with regret as Ignis again pulls away and covers his face with his hands.

“Noct. Enough. I can’t--”

“Iggy, wait.” Noctis grips his wrists and draws his hands away, then tangles his fingers with Ignis’s. “There’s something else I know. Something you don’t.”

Ignis’s breath catches in this throat. “That is?” His voice is thick, strangled.

“Those who bear the Ring of the Lucii and are judged worthy are bound to the Line of the Kings forever.” Noctis can’t reveal too much about what the Six have shown him -- that isn’t for Ignis to know -- but he can’t go without sharing the only thing giving him hope.

Ignis’s breath catches. “Meaning?” His voice is hesitant, shaky.

“It means,” he takes a deep breath. “We will see each other again. When it’s all over.”

“When you’ve  _ died _ ?” Ignis sits up on his elbow, his voice strangely sharp. 

Noctis startles. “How did you--” He wasn’t going to tell the guys until they had to know. Not until he had to.

“You are not the only one given the ‘gift’ of vision,” Ignis whispers darkly, sinking onto his back once more.

Noctis struggles to catch his breath, then laughs humorlessly, more a distressed bleat. “So you knew. You knew all along.”

“Yes.”

A strange calm spreads over Noctis, and he feels himself smile despite wanting to cry at the injustice of all of this. He leans in, pressing his forehead to Ignis’s and feeling the sharp intake of breath against his lips.

“Noct--?”

“Then know this too,” Noctis whispers, his lips nearly brushing Ignis’s scarred, split lips. “When I go, I’ll be waiting for you. And you’ll have a place by my side. Forever.”

“How can you promise that?” Ignis’s voice trembles, and for the first time Noctis can ever remember, he sounds vulnerable. Frightened.

“Because I’m the True King, remember?” Noctis whispers, for the first time actually believing those words. “We’re bound by this ring,” he laces his fingers through Ignis’s and squeezes. “And by something even more powerful. When the time comes, I will be waiting for you. I promise.”

**Author's Note:**

> I can't get enough Ignoct in my life! I have often thought about how Ignis got on with his life after Noct makes his sacrifice, and I wanted to show a brief scene where he is given some hope for a happy reunion. I hope you enjoy, and I appreciate the opportunity to write this.


End file.
